Knitting With Granny LJ

Good morning.

The weather here on the Oregon Coast has not been very much like May or June. So Karen and I decided we would take advantage of the sunshine this morning and get the boys down on the beach for a good walkabout.  And we would have a look backward about the show.  There was another walker with his dog on the beach so we kept ours on leads and walked down by the surf while he and his played “chase the ball and bring it back”  up near the cliff.

On our walk we found a Styrofoam float that had been in the water for some time.  How did we know?  Well, the thing was covered in barnacles.  I thought maybe I’d bring it home, but then decided against it because it would probably smell pretty bad after a day or two.  Then I saw something  right on the edge of the surf that looked like something I needed to check out and carry  home.  And it was!   It was a Japanese glass float.  I wanted to jump up and down and shout hurray.  But I was a good kid, and stuck in the pocket of my jacket and smiled all the way home. 

Finding that float was almost as good as finding some dynamite yarn that needs to come home with me and become a cap.  I have not been yarn shopping in a couple of months.  It is very hard to not feel a bit whiney about it.l  But I got some fine yarns from Arlene at the show and have some more that I got from Kristy recently. 

The not-driving thing really puts a damper on my getting around about.  Especially getting out and about to yarn stores.  I love going in and feeling the yarns and imaging what kind of cap they will make. 

 But I do have to restyle my yarn buying.  There is a catalog that I get and it has some of the brands of yarn that I buy  on a regular basis.  And there is a place on-line that sells some more of my base yarns, so I will just order from them. 

Though it is not quite the same as walking into a store, touching the Alpaca yarn and getting one of those lightbulbs going off (you know, the cartoon type).  Just like I could go into one of the local gift shops and buy any number of glass floats. But finding the one today is more like touching the Alpaca yarn and knowing, really knowing, what a great cap it would make.

Have a great day.  Happy knitting.  Granny LJ

Good morning.

What I  want to talk about  today is a question that popped up a bit ago on my blog comments site.  The writer wanted to know what “earth tones” are when it comes to knitting.  For those who need a refresher on my lack of color skills please refer back to the entry of March 16, 2009. 

I think a case could be made for every color being an “earth tone.”  You can see every color (the ones we earthlings have)  right here on the planet surface, after all.  But what comes to my mind when I think or talk about “earth tones”  are the colors that are browns, beiges, grays, sometimes green (depending on whether the green has a yellow base or a blue base) — the colors that are associated with growing things.

I don’t usually gravitate toward earth tones when shopping for yarn or clothing.  I love blue, and  have, as I get older, developed a love for lavender colors.  When I enter a yarn store, I immediately focus on what I call the jewel colors of yarns:  Reds, blues, lavenders, greens (if they have a blue base), whites (true whites, not the off whites). 

However, since I have been doing the caps I have noticed that a lot of people prefer the colors that I am not particularly fond of — the earth tones.  At the market last weekend, I looked at my inventory and noted that I had a lot of caps that fall into my category of earth tones.  I decided that I may have over-estimated the need for earth tone caps. 

As a result of the weekend show’s Voila! moment, I have begun topping off a jade green beram, and have a lovely plum purple cap ready for double points.  And yesterday I was rummaging my stash and found a lovely skein of garnet red yarn and another in variegated lavenders.

The result of all this:  I am going to be turning out a mess of jewel colored caps for a while.  That is where my heart finds joy in my knitting.  I also have a lovely pale blue with lavender highlights yarn that was hand spun by my spinning friend, Arlene.  And have another skein of rainbow colored yarn that I got from my spinning friend, Kristy. 

Well, knitting friends, the yarns are waving at me and calling.  Have to get going on those jewel tone caps.

Yellow?  I did not mention yellow?  Of all the colors, yellow (except in sunshine) is my least favorite color.  Am not even fond of it in daffodils.  Yellow hits my eyes with a ferocity that makes me uncomfortable just being near it.  I enjoy yellow highlights in a yarn but a stark yellow yarn hurts my eyes so I never work in it.

I suppose that other knitters have a favorite colors, and I would like to hear from some of your about your favorites and how you use them.

Happy knitting.  Granny LJ

Good morning.

Well, Karen and I did the back-to-back shows and survived.  The one we did last weekend was the Yachats Annual Art show.  It has been in existence for over 40 years and so the crowds are good sized.  That is good because part of doing the show is to get people familiarized with your work and doing a lot of PR for yourself. 

Like all shows and markets it had its good things and the not-so-good things.  The big not-so-good thing about this show was that we were in a small room with 7 other vendors.  That was not so bad in and of itself.  But atmosphere in the room was den of negativity.  Out of the 8 spaces only 3 of us tried to maintain a upbeat atmosphere.  The negativity got to me so badly by the second day, Karen told me to go walk around The Commons until I felt better.  So I did.  And it did help.  It is hard to see all the wonderful work that people do and talk to them about their work be grumpy about anything. 

We met a lot of nice people — both vendors and potential customers.  One vendor, a lady, from the far end of The Commons came on a walkabout and stopped at our booth.  In the course of talking with her, we discovered that we know a lot of the same people in the knitting world of Oregon.  So we had lots to talk about.  She and her husband sell herbal teas and other herbal products and her husband is a beginning knitter.  So  we, all three, talked knitting and yarns. 

The only other knitting artisan in the show was in our room and she was one of the mega-grumpy ones. So we did not talk much about our work.  I think she saw me as competition and that is unfortunate.  We might have been able to be knitting/yarn friends. 

We had good crowds coming through.  They  looked and talked and admired all the beauty of the crafts and art works that were there.  Both Karen and I would  have loved to have had more sales, but, again, part of the job of doing the shows is getting yourself and your work out and in front of folks.  After all, the person who walks by at this show may stop and buy at the next show. 

Have a great day.  Happy knitting.  Granny LJ

Good morning.

English is a great language.  It takes a little bit from here or from there and makes new words.  Rather like moss growing on a stone.  For instance the word alcoholic is, as everyone knows, the word for a person who drinks too much alcohol.  Well, our English took that word and incorporated the end “-holic” into the language.  And now we can have all sorts of -holics.  I have known people who were sugarholics, gismoholics and on and on.  I have a cousin who is a toolholic.  My father was an odds-and-endsholic.  I swear the man never threw a thing away.   My younger brother says he does not have a -holic problem, but I think he may be kidding himself.  You should see his garage. 

Me?  I’d like to say that I don’t have any -holics, but I can’t and continue to consider myself an honorable person. 

I am a bookaholic and a yarnaholic.  (I’m sure I have more -holics, but will not discuss any now, thank you very much.)

When I was a kid I was at least a year younger than the other kids in the neighborhood.  They all went to school and learned to read.  I was the only one I knew who could not read.  My mother got me a Dick and Jane book and I learned to read “Run, Dick, run.”  “See funny Jane.”  “Come, Spot, come.”   It really wasn’t  all that much, but I could read.  The next step was to get a library card and I was reading everything I could find — in the way of horse stories and dog stories. Later I advanced to Sue Barton, Student Nurse, and followed her career until she got into administration stories. 

The yarnaholic time of my life started many, many years later.  When I started knitting caps, I got yarn from BiMart and some plastic (and bent) knitting needles from my mother.  I would make one cap at a time and even do the finish work before I cast on a new cap. 

Then I went into the yarn store that was in the Mission-Mill Museum complex and discovered the book on knitted tams.  I got it.  And I got yarn for a simple cap for a good friend of mine.  It was almost her  birthday. While I was there, I found some really gorgeous yarn in a rusty colored brown.  I had no idea what to do with it, but like the book, it called out to me.  So I took it home too.  The next trip to the yarn store at the Mission-Mill  netted me some metal straight needles, size 8, and enough yarn to make caps for several family members for Christmas. 

Thus  a yarnaholic was born.  What I did not realize at the time I gave into my yarnaholism was that it also gave me a great opportunity to feed my bookaholism.  You would not believe the number of books that are out there to teach you the ultimate in knitting techniques.  I was on cloud-9.  I could go into one store and feed both my -holics at once. 

What I think is that everybody has a -holic or two.  I am delighted with mine.  I hope you are with yours, too.

Happy knitting.   Granny LJ

Good morning.

Had a great week last week.  The weather has been almost balmy — and is balmy, compared to what is happing in Des Moines (where my eldest son and his family live) and New York City (where my second son and his wife live).  We have had sun shine, not much wind, and tides that are so low, it feels like you could walk to China.  As a result, Karen and I have been getting Parker and Red out for very long wonderful walks. 

I have been knitting my fingers to the quick, though, after the walks.  Karen and I found out that we are juried into a show in March.  This one is in Yachats, at the Commons, and it is over 40 years old.  The organizers have taken trouble to keep the show pretty exclusive.  We sent out the application on a kind of a dare without much hope of getting in to it.  We got notification last week that we are in it.  What a morale boost.

Enough news.  I was recently asked how I make a cap with eyelash yarn.  I do them as inside-out (IO) caps because of the peculiar way I knit.   The IO caps started out as a bit of an accident.  I was working a varigated brown Splash yarn with a coordinating brown Galway.  I had tried to do a cap out of only the Splash and it was pretty floppy and not very good for beach walking.  So with this cap I put it with the sturdier yarn and was knitting away.  Because of the goofy way I knit (I’m self taught, remember?) all the Splash yarn was on the inside of the cap. 

Needless to say, I was pretty grumpy because I thought I would  have to pull all the fibers of the Splash back through to the outside of the cap with a crochet hook.  I had done that on a couple of earlier caps and pretty much resented the time it took to get all those fibers back to the outside.  Well, the brown Splash and Galway cap got  topped.  I put it in the basket of “to be finished” work, and went to work on a new cap. 

When I finally got to doing the finish work, I grabbed up the brown Galway and Splash cap and turned it inside-out  to start working in the ends.  And I had one of those “No DUH!”  moments.  I did not have to pull all the ends of the Splash through.  I just had to finish the cap as if the inside were the outside.  And the 7-point top-off really worked well inside out.  And thus the Inside-Out cap was born.

If you are interested in doing a cap with an eyelash yarn, I would suggest that you do a simple watch cap alternating 2 rows of the eyelash with 2 rows of the base yarn.  The two rows of the base yarn give the cap a sturdiness that the eyelash lacks and the eyelash essentially covers the 2 rows of the base yarn. 

When the cap is knit and topped, do the finish work  on whichever side of the cap has the most eyelash yarn showing. 

I have also found that  making a chemo cap this way is better, too.  When I started chemo caps, I was just making them out of the Chinchilla, a Berroco yarn.   This method  gave them a floppy, almost too soft feel.  Once I discovered the IO cap method, I started using a base yarn for chemo caps, too.  And I am more satisfied with the outcome of the chemo caps with this method, too. 

Try it. I am sure you will like it. 

Happy knitting.  Granny LJ

Good morning:

Knitting is filled with all sorts of very necessary abbreviations.  Some include:  K2tog  aka knit two stitchs  together;  YO aka yarn over; P aka purl and the list goes on and on.  But I think that most crafts have their own special terminology.  I know that a rock-hound uncle of mine introduced me to a rock called leaverite.  I was very interested in finding some leaverite until I realized I was walking on leaverite and that most of the river’s rock bed was composed of leaverite. For those who are not rock hounds leaverite is the rock you leave right where you find it. 

As noted above, knitting has its own incredible abbreviations.  One that still has me kind of bewildered is the SSK.  Am still looking at pictures in the back of magazines trying to figure that one out. I can do an SK just fine.  That is the stitch where you slip one stitch from the left needle to the right needle, knit the next stitch and then slip the first stitch back over the knitted stitch.   But that SSK still  has me bafffled.

Two really important knitting abbreviations that you will probably never find in a knitting magazine or knitting instruction book are:  WIP and UKO.

The WIP is the easiest to grasp.  It is the project that is on your needles or the Work in Progress.  Now a lot of knitters, I know, have only one WIP.  The table on the left side of my work chair is my WIP table.  At this precise moment, I have a WIP table reaching close to the height of Mt Everest.  This is because I have several sets of circular needles and have a cap cast on to all of them  most of the time.  Along with the projects are the directions for the various WIPs.  And along with the WIPs and the directions for them are the latest additions to my yarn stash, like the beautiful rainbow colored yarn I got at the Winterfest Market last weekend.  That yarn is so gorgeous that I just want to keep looking at it.  Eventually, I will find the right pattern for it.  The colorway of the yarn is pretty busy with all the color changes.  But I think I will probably make it up in a busy pattern that keeps the eyes  bouncing. 

At any rate, that is WIP. 

The next abbreviations necessary to a lot of knitters — myself in particular — is UKO.  Translated out of knitting and into English is Unidentified Knitted Object.  I have not a clue how many knitters have UKOs.  I have a lot.  I created one last weekend when I was  at the market.  Thought I had an idea for using some left over yarn and worked hard on it all day Saturday and Sunday.  Yesterday, I took it out of my little project  bag and pulled the needles out and cast on something else.   It was just that the longer I worked on the UKO the worse it got.  Eventually,  I’ll take out the stitches, rewind the yarn and let it rest and then cast it on in another cap.  The one I worked on so diligently all weekend was just too ugly for words  — the only thing reasonable to do with it was UKO the thing. 

Happy knitting.  Granny LJ

Good morning.

I have not lost much weight at Weight Watchers since I started.  But I have found a new friend.  She came to the meeting one Thursday in a hand knit cap.  I am always interested in caps when I see them, so I took myself by the hand and walked across the room and asked if she had made the cap.  She had not made it, but was learning to knit. 

A week or so later, she was wearing a beautiful off-white cap in a simple lace pattern.  I asked her again, and she said, yes she had made the cap.  After the meeting we talked a little more about knitting.  She is a new knitter and like a lot of new knitters has several projects going.  She told me that she wanted to do a cap like the off-white but a bit smaller for her daughter.  I suggested she cast on 92 stitches instead of the more than 100 stitches the pattern called for.  We talked for a little bit longer about knitting. 

Then, I found out about the Spin-In.  At the next meeting I asked if she would like to go.  She said she would. 

So, last Saturday, off we went to  Newport and the Spin-In. My plan was to introduce my new friend to some old friends and give her a chance to see another side of things.  I was NOT going to get any yarn.  I was going to look and  see if  next year’s Spin-In might be a venue for selling my caps.  And I was NOT going to get any yarn. 

We got to the Spin-In about 1 p.m. and there were 2 or 3 big circles of  with 10 to 20 spinners per circle.  Around the edge of the room were the vendors.  The first person I saw was Elsie, a spinner I know from a couple of summers ago when Karen and I did the Saturday Market in Newport.  I introduced Elise to my new friend and we looked briefly at the rovings she had in her space.  A couple spaces to the left were Arlene and Lyle, my friends from Crafts on the Coast.  I introduced her to them.  Arlene was spinning and Lyle was selling his small area rugs.   

My friend and I visited a bit with Lyle and Arlene and then wandered off to look at the other spaces.  About that time, the Spin-In organizers drew a number for a door prize.  Arlene won a beautiful skein of handspun, undyed Shetland.  The color is hard to define.  Sort of a white with strands of gray and brown through it.  It is gorgeous.  I promised Arlene I would have it done up by Crafts On the Coast in May. 

As my friend and I wandered around the edge of the room, I found a space with some of the most wonderful, incredible varigated lavender, purple, red and blue yarn.  It was so soft that I wanted to sped the rest of the day rubbing it against my cheek. But I bought some instead.   We managed to get through the rest of the vendor area without finding any more things that I could not live without. 

We saw Kristy at the sign-in table and I introduced her to my friend and we talked a minute.  Kristy is going to be at Winterfest next weekend.  Told her that I had one skein of the yarn I got from her in January done up and would be showing it in the February show. 

My friend and I started toward the door then.  I think she was a little overwhelmed by it all.  I know I was.  And then I got hooked in again.  By the door to the parking lot was a booth that displayed the most incredible lavender/burgundy colored yarn.  It is just about 20 yards shy of the 200 yards needed to make a cap. I tried to talk myself out of getting it, and lost the argument.  So when I left the Spin-In I was possessed with the makings for 3 great caps. 

My friend was a bit more provident than I was and when we left the parking lot I suggested that we stop at Yarn for All Seasons on our way home.  I had spent all my cash, but I wanted to introduce my friend to that shop  ….    Well, more about that stop tomorrow.

Good morning.

Most of the shows I have done here on the coast have been pretty good experiences. The vendors are vending or cruising to get acquainted with other vendors, or working on their art/craft to show the customers how their work is created. 

I’m sort of in between.  I like to cruise some and spend the time at our space working on a cap as well as greeting potential customers.  With both of us working the space  we have it covered because I can show Karen’s work as well as she can show mine. 

But this last weekend, we had a vendor who definitely fit the category of “not-so-good.” 

She was in the Waldport summer market last year.  She always arrived late.  She came with the candles she had made and at least one child and sometimes both her kids.  I noticed  she spent more time taking care of her kids than her space.   But that is what a mother does when she has 2 kids in diapers.   I was never close enough to her space that I was much bothered by her and the children and really did not pay too much attention to them.

Well, she was at the market last weekend, and even an enclosed space as large as a gym is not big enough for some things.   She came late (we opened at 10 a.m. and she got there about 11:30 a.m.) and had to have a table carried to her space.  She brought the older kid.  He was asleep while she set up.  

By the time she was set up, her son was awake and wanting to walk around and be a kid.   So she had to take him on a walk before she could start selling.  And she was doing candlemaking demonstrations — or trying to.  At one point she was cleaning  up spilled  red wax from the floor and her son was making loud protestations over something that did not suit him.  Toward the end of the day, a woman stopped by our space and I started talking to her.  She was a friend of the candle lady and would be working the space on Sunday while the candle lady and her family went to church. 

The next day, Karen had a phone call from the candle lady wanting more candles brought to the show from her space at Shorebirds.  So we gathered up the rest of her candles and took them to Yachats when we drove down.  We put the box in the candle lady’s space and left it. 

Her friend arrived and obligingly worked the space until noon, when the candle lady was supposed to be there.  However, she was a no-show.  All day long.  She did not call her friend or let anyone know that she was not going to work her space.  At 4 o’clock, tear down time, there was still no word from her.  

Well, since Sunday, the scuttlebutt is that she did not come back to the show because the  show’s organizer  advised her to leave her child at home and concentrate on working her space.  She had apparently shut off her phone on Sunday so no one could contact her. The friend working the space was sure she had been in a car wreck  But what she was doing was hiding out. The last rumor we heard about her is that she was going to leave her kids with her parents and go to Haiti and join the rescue work there. 

Knowing the organizer of the market as I do, my guess is, if the candle lady  does not go to Haiti, she will have to sell her candles someplace else.  Her  behavior was a rotten example to both vendors and potential customers.  And I think she will be looking for a new friend, too.  

Well, I have a bunch of lovely lavender and purple yarns to roll and I need to get going.

Happy knitting.   Granny LJ

Good morning.

Well, the first show if the new year is history.  Karen  got 1 special order and the probability of 3 more.  Her special orders are for pet portraits.  Though she did not make any cash money, the special orders will generate money a little later. 

I actually made 3 cap sales.   I had 1 the first day and 2 the second day. So we  paid for our space and did a lot of   talking to other vendors.  A show is really made by its vendors.  And for the most part, this show was a good one –everyone working at their space and getting out and around a little bit and making friends and looking at the work of the other  vendors. 

To my great excitement, a local spinner was at the show.  So the first day,  I got  200 yards of a wonderful hot pink yarn and spent the rest of the day getting it wound into a workable ball and casting on and kitting the base of a new cap.   During that time, I sold a cap.  It was the one Noro Silk Garden cap that I had left.  I felt pretty good after that sale, because that sale paid for our space at the show.

The next morning, I cleaned out all my various money sources — I mean, who really needs bread and butter when there are great yarns waiting to be brought home and turned into incredible caps.  So, the first thing the morning of the second day, I  bought over 400 yards of a lovely pale lavender she had dyed and spun. 

Then, who would have thought it — I sold 2 more caps.  So a trotted off to the spinner’s space and bought 200 yards each of a burgundy yarn and a grape purple yarn.  And, guess what folks?  The three are complimentary colors.  So I now have the  yarn to make 2 really gorgeous 3-color caps, with enough yarn left over for a 3rd cap out of the pale lavender. 

I have no errands to run today so I will get my exercise in and get to knitting.  I sure wish knitting burned as much energy and adipose tissue as jumping jacks.  Oh well, it was a great weekend, and I will probably write about it all week.

Happy knitting.  Granny LJ

Good morning.

I have had the question come up about making a career out of knitting — as in how to.

I am not really a very good person to ask about careers in knitting. Those of you who have read my earlier blog entries know that I sort of stumbled into this capping career. 

First let me say that I am not sure that a younger person could make a career knitting.  Knitting is more of a cottage craft and the income is so variable and unpredictable that I would not recommend it as career opportunity.  Knitting and/or crafting is a great way to express your artistic side and bring in a little money while doing it.  Don’t expect to get rich, because except in rare occasions does getting rich happen.

That said, this is how I do it. 

I selected caps because I know myself well enough to know that if I did sweaters, I would probably do a back and move on to the back of another sweater.  I mean, with sweaters you have to do 2 of everything…. A front AND a back, 2 sleeves that also have a front and a back.   Mittens and socks are the same — you have to make 2 mittens and 2 socks.  And I know that I would make one mitten or one sock and never get to the other one.  I tried making long straight things that end up being mufflers.  Those were totally boring and I really do not like working on straight needles. 

I settled on caps because people only  have 1 head, I like to work in really wonderful yarns and I can work in those wonderful yarns without exhausting my budget getting enough yarn to do a larger project.  A cap takes only about 200 yards of yarn. And the left-over yarns from one cap project can be used in another cap project.  Caps are limitless.  There is no end to what can be done with 200 yards of yarn and a pair of circular needles. So I have always told myself and anyone else who would listen that when I ran out of cap ideas, I would try knitting something else.

I try to knit at least 4 hours a day.  I have set up this schedule because, given my Creaky Body Syndrome (CBS), those 4 hours are when I am most alert and focused.  I work in  some  patterns that are pretty complicated, and alternate those with simple projects like guy caps. 

My record keeping is as easy as I can make it.  Right now I am experimenting with 3 x 5 cards which give me the cap number, and where the cap is located. 

I sell my caps at markets and shows and at Shorebirds.  As noted above, the sales are really sporadic and one time you go to a market and sell nothing and the next time you sell maybe 3 or 4.  It is unpredictable. And if I were making the caps my sole source of income, I would not need to be going to Weight Watchers. 

I am retired and so I have a bit of income each  month from other sources and I am able to put my earnings from sales back into  yarn and have a pretty good sized yarn stash. 

Also, I live in a county, Lincoln County, which runs real high to retired folks and it has 2 good connections to the Willamette Valley, which  adds up to  lots of tourists in the summer and fall months.  Not only does this mean customers, it also means that the Lincoln County retired people who have been waiting until retirement to do that thing that they have always wanted to do (wood carving, furniture making, herbal remedies, jewelry creating and so forth)  are also in high supply. As a result it is possible to work the shows and markets year round if you have enough time to keep the product as plentiful as the potential customers. 

Well, that is an overview of things and I will continue later with some more details and a look at other crafters, artisans and artists that I know and how they do their art and sell it, too. 

Happy knitting.  Granny LJ